PSE&G recognized for use of social media during Sandy

Jun. 6, 2013

Public Service Electric and Gas Company was recently recognized for its use of Twitter as a communication tool in the aftermath of superstorm Sandy by CS Week and J.D. Power & Associates.

On Tuesday, Jorge Cardenas, vice president of asset management and centralized services for PSE&G, presented at a Homeland Security congressional subcommittee hearing to discuss how social media and new technologies are transforming preparedness, response and disaster recovery.

In his report, Cardenas reviewed the widespread impact of Sandy within the PSE&G coverage area including 48,000 trees downed, 2,400 utility poles destroyed and 29 switching and substations flooded with “walls of water.”

Ninety percent of PSE&G’s 2.2 million electric customers lost power and more than 40,000 gas customers were impacted, said Cardenas.

Before Sandy, the utility company relied on email to correspond with 800,000 customers and tweets to 15,000 followers on Twitter. After Sandy, the PSE&G brand accounts gained almost 47,000 new followers, resulting in the largest Twitter community of any utility in the U.S., according to the report.

On average, more than 500 tweets were broadcast by PSE&G each day during that time period. At one point, it exceeded the amount of tweets allowed per day and had to reach out to Twitter management to expand its capacity.

The utility logged 90,000 inbound storm-related tweets and staffed the company’s Twitter channels with a team of 22 people who provided 15 hours of daily coverage for 17 days.

“And throughout it all, we were frank about the challenges and setbacks we faced — as well as our victories,” Cardenas explained during his discussion about the types of messages and information sent through Twitter.